


Mind's Eye

by Arsenic



Series: Mind's Eye [1]
Category: Bandom, My Chemical Romance, Panic! at the Disco
Genre: Angst, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2007-09-14
Updated: 2007-09-14
Packaged: 2020-07-10 06:23:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19901236
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arsenic/pseuds/Arsenic
Summary: Telepathy AU





	Mind's Eye

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Cheshireempress in the Mikey AU Meme.

Mikey woke up from the nightmare that wasn't his and did a little poking. Gerard was sleeping just fine, disjointed art images tumbling through his mind; Spencer was dreaming of his dogs. Mikey whispered, "Ryan, Ryan," even though Ryan couldn't hear his voice. Ryan could hear _him_ just fine. Ryan was the strongest of all of them, unfortunately for him. He was also the one least able to control mental bleed. "C'mon, Ry, wake up."

Mikey closed his eyes against the sharpness of Ryan waking, even though it was all in his mind. After a bit, a thin, anemic sounding, "Thanks," traveled through the open lines of his neural synapses. Mikey sent along an image of himself giving Ryan a hug, and then fell back asleep.

*

The four of them were prototypes, or so they were told. Minds to change the future. As far as Mikey was concerned, the present had been doing fairly all right at bringing along its own minds of the future, but clearly Mind Over Matter, Inc. hadn't agreed. MOM was largely government funded, and while Mikey was pretty sure--if the minds of some of the scientists that Mikey sometimes accidentally "overheard" were any indication--they ran other projects, their main concern was creating advancements in humans for the purpose of warfare.

There had been tests. Nobody had known it, the tests had masqueraded as normal, standardized testing. Only then, there had been other tests, things that their doctors had informed their parents were necessary. Those had been lies, as it turned out, all kind of coercion techniques had been practiced upon school teachers and physicians and several other innocent bystanders, but the damage was done. Military had come for Gerard and Mikey in the night, full out soldiers. They had huddled in the car that took them from their home, their parents, and Gerard had told Mikey, "It's okay, I won't let them hurt you."

There was nothing Gerard could do to stop them. Ryan tried, that first day. Mikey hadn't known his name then, thought of him as a mixture of Crazy and Brave, but when they'd gone for Spencer Ryan had grabbed a nearby beaker, shattered it in his hand and stood in front of Spencer holding jagged glass. The soldiers who were forever around converged on him like he wasn't some scared kid, even while Spencer screamed, "No! No! I'll do whatever you want!"

They'd kept Ryan in handcuffs after that, for a week, until the experiments became so painful that the last thing any of them could think about was resistance. That had been months--Mikey thought maybe five, but it could have been more, time was irrelevant--ago, and Ryan still had scars on his wrists. They'd left him in them while he was sleeping, everything. They'd fed him through a tube, laughing at him watching Mikey, Gerard and Spencer eat. All three of them had sneaked him food when possible, fed it to him by hand.

The experiments were-- Mikey didn't think about them if he didn't have to. He had scars all over the surface of his skull. They all did. Sometimes, when he woke to Ryan's nightmares, it was hard to tell for the first few seconds, hard to be sure they weren't his own.

*

At breakfast, Ryan looked up at Mikey and thought, _Could I have an actual one?_

Mikey didn't have to ask what he meant, he just nodded. Spencer tilted his head fractionally. _Guys?_

Mikey played with his food. _He just wants a hug._

Spencer's mind clattered with a bit of panic and Mikey felt the words, _behind you_ , right before he felt the barrel of one of the soldier's rifles in his back. The soldier said, "You know the rules, no playing with the toys."

They weren't supposed to use the telepathy if not under supervision. Mikey panted, and Gerard snapped, "He wasn't doing anything." He rubbed a little at the sore spot on Mikey's back. There would be a bruise. Mikey couldn't tell if the guy had gotten his kidneys or not. He hoped not, that was always the worst. He had to learn to control his expressions, his gestures when he was "talking." He took another bite of his food and made himself chew.

*

They worked on Ryan that day and there was no way to get to him, nor any way to cut off his cries of pain, the way he held himself back from pleading. They had all pleaded at first, all of them. Spencer still would, on occasion, mostly for Ryan. They had learned though, learned that it got them nowhere. Spencer tucked himself into a ball and wouldn't unfurl even for Gerard, who sat with him, stroking shakily at his back. At some point, Ryan "cried," _Sorry, sorry_ , and it was different enough from the incoherency of everything else that Mikey understood it was meant for them.

*

He hugged Ryan at dinner that night, just sat down next to him and pulled Ryan into his arms. Ryan thought, tiredly, _your back._

Mikey whispered, "Whatever."

The three of them cajoled Ryan into eating--it was a ritual, whomever had been worked on that day never wanted to eat--and Mikey held him through as much of the meal as he could. Because Ryan's mind was cold and empty in ways that it never was, ways that scared Mikey, Mikey let him know the one thing he'd been able to hide all this time, the one secret Mikey still had. _I would kiss you. If it wasn't like this. If I was out there and I could buy you dinner and a movie, or maybe even just go dutch, I would kiss you._

_You wouldn't know me._

_I would have found you._

Ryan's mind was a collage of images then, much more like normal, of words and emotions and worlds that Mikey hadn't yet seen, but wanted to. One thought came through all of it: _You did. You found me._


End file.
